| Chicago to LA is about 2,000 miles. So in the article about 200 miles driving (in California) is 1 in a million chance of dying. So lets use that number nationwide to be lazy. Now we can move a decimal point over. So the death chances of a Chicago to LA drive is 100,000 in one. But you drive back, so then its that twice. Once in 50,000 people dying on a Chicago to LA and back roadtrip is extremely frightening. How many people from the midwest make this drive a year? Or from the east coast? How many don't make it back? The USA, on average, has 100+ fatalities via auto transportation a day. The above ignores serious injury, permanent disability, etc. Its just death. The chances of having to deal with a broken spine, losing a limb, blindness, 3rd degree burns all over your body, etc aren't even calculated, but those are real and far more common than death. Death being harder to achieve with modern medical treatments. Cars are extremely dangerous. We downplay what it means to drive. |
I wondered about that reading some of the comments about the 737 Max. We routinely travel in exponentially more risky ways all the time, yet we expend time thinking about the safety benefit of avoiding a specific type of aircraft.
Not downplaying airline safety as a whole there, but thinking about it for yourself on a personal level is maybe not moving the needle.